Come Here, Kitten (God of War Book 1), стр. 27
Maybe I could store her away in one of the spare rooms that he never went into, play with her when he was taking over some pack and trying to find that stone, feed her early in the morning when he was still sleeping. I didn’t want him to—
Suddenly, a window near the front of the store shattered into a million pieces. Mothers pulled their pups to their chests, leaving their carts and hurrying to the back exit. People started yelling and screaming in panic, sprinting down the aisles toward us.
A vicious growl echoed throughout the store, and I froze. That wasn’t the growl of an average wolf … that was the sound of a hound. I clutched my backpack and Charolette’s hand and ran toward the rear exit.
Hundreds of people crowded around the door and tried to squeeze out of it. I swung my backpack over my shoulder, grabbed the silver knife from the side pocket, and told Charolette to guard Ruffles with her life.
“What are you doing?” she asked, shaking her head. “We need to get out of here. Ares will be here to stop—”
Another growl ripped through the room, and a hound turned down our aisle. He stared at me, ignoring all other wolves around him, and sprinted in my direction. Bloodied saliva dripped from his sharp canines, his piercing yellow eyes fixed on me.
I clutched the knife until my knuckles turned white. There was no escaping these monstrosities. For years, I had tried to hide from them … but they always seemed to find me.
With terrifying yellow eyes, the hound rushed down the aisle, springing himself forward on his two hind legs. Foam oozing from his mouth, teeth dripping with blood, he was coming for me. They always came for me.
I stepped in front of Charolette and Ruffles, determined to protect them with my life. The silver knife burned my palm, but the pain was never as bad as the pain of watching a loved one being torn apart by ruthless animals.
When he leaped into the air, all I could see was Jeremy. Being severed to pieces. His limbs being ripped off. The hounds devouring his flesh. The images were forever lodged into my memory. Never to leave.
“Aurora!” Charolette screamed.
The hound dug his claws into my arm, and I howled out in pain. Moon Goddess, I wanted to shift. I wanted to kill him with my teeth. I wanted him to pay for everything that his kind had done to me. But I hated that I couldn’t shift and despised myself for it.
I clutched the knife harder, pretended that the gash in my arm wasn’t bleeding profusely, and hopped out of the way before he could hurt me again. I sprinted down the aisle to get him away from the others and stood between the chips and my cart of cat litter.
Just as I’d hoped, he turned on his paw, wildly shook his head, and stalked toward me once more. I would kill this piece of shit before he could hurt anyone ever again.
In the distance, I heard Ares growl, claws tearing into fur, and the whimpers of the hounds. My wolf called out to our mate, and I forced her to shut up. I could handle this beast myself.
Coming at me faster this time, the hound sprinted down the aisle. When he leaped at me, I crouched down, stepped out of the way, and stabbed the damn thing right in his neck. The monster growled in pain and fell to the ground on his back.
I crawled on top of the animal, straddling his waist to keep him in place, and stabbed him over and over, right into the jugular. This was for everything that had happened to me. This was for my inability to shift. This was for Jeremy.
Blood sprayed onto my face and gushed out of the open wound in my arm. Tears welled up in my eyes. But I didn’t stop. I hated them so much. Thoughts of them tortured me every single fucking day.
“Aurora,” Charolette called.
The hound lay limply under me, yet I took the blade, cut right through the few threads of skin left holding the hound’s head in place, and ripped off the skin to make sure this fucker didn’t come back.
I saw red.
Figuratively and literally.
“Aurora!” she shouted again.
Suddenly, someone scooped me into their strong arms and picked me up off the hound. My silver dagger slipped out of my hand, and the scent of hazelnut engulfed me. My body relaxed in Ares’s arms, but all I wanted to do was continue to make the hound hurt, displace all this pain I’d been carrying around for the past ten years.
Blood dripped from Ares’s canines. His chest was stained red. All I could see was wrath in his eyes. I squirmed in his hold, yet he didn’t let me down. The hound was lying dead in the middle of the store, and I could only imagine that there were others dead in the forest. Ares pulled me closer to him, letting me feel his raging heartbeat.
I took a deep breath, breathing with the rhythm. Calm, Aurora. Calm.
He walked to Charolette, placed me onto the ground, and looked at Marcel, who was drenched in blood from head to toe next to her. “Double security around the borders. Nobody comes onto the property, and nobody leaves the property without me knowing. Kill anyone who disobeys.”
Marcel nodded, glanced quickly at me, his lips curling into a smirk, and handed me my silver knife. I growled and snatched it from him, wanting to cut all of his locks of stupid silver hair and keep it as a trophy.
When Marcel left, Ares examined Charolette to make sure she was okay, and then he snatched my wrist and dragged me toward the exit of the